He reached behind her, the movement forcing her shoulder to graze his broad chest. He was studying her with an expression of such intensity that it quite flustered Elizabeth. Heat stung her cheeks, and she averted her gaze, pinning a glare at the empty squab opposite her, which seemed to mock.
“Have we met before, Miss Brooke?” he asked, his voice a low, decadent rumble that played with old emotions long left dormant.
“I dare say not,” she forced out firmly.
And that was not an untruth. They had never been formally introduced. The extent of their interactions had been her naïve adoration as she watched his handsome form from across various ballrooms.
“Hmm,” he said, a noncommittal hum, and she couldn’t be certain what it meant.
Perhaps nothing.
But then, his bare fingertips grazed the sensitive skin of her inner wrist as he attempted to work the knot free, and her ability to contemplate anything other than his touch vanished.
He was not wearing gloves. Apparently, kidnappings did not require the trappings of gentility. And nor was she, for neither did surreptitious jaunts to one’s employer’s library. Her one lapse in judgment and look at what had come of it.
His fingertips brushed over her again, this time her palms, and she discovered that she was not entirely incapable of feeling there. Her heart beat fast and hard, and she could not suppress a quick inhalation of breath, nor the sudden shower of sparks burning up her arm. Elizabeth didn’t want these feelings. She didn’t want this man’s proximity, nor the reminders of her past foolishness he was unwittingly dredging up within her.
“Please, my lord, make haste,” she urged, surrounded by his scent and undone by his touch.
How pathetic she was.
“I’m trying, madam. However, the knot has tightened. Perhaps you would not mind shifting on the seat so that I may have better access?”
Yes, perhaps if he were at her back, ignoring him would be easier.
She moved as he had asked, trying to ignore the manner in which her bottom brushed against his thigh. “Better?”
“One hopes,” he quipped, apparently seeking to find the levity in their disastrous predicament.
When there was none.
She was all too aware of everything—his presence at her back, his fingers working on her bonds, his steady, even breaths falling hotly on her nape.
“Blast,” he muttered. “The dratted thing does not wish to be opened.”
The carriage slowed, and Elizabeth wondered if they had reached Lord Worthing’s town house. Panic rose, mingling with the detested effects of his nearness on her.
“I must get back inside at once.” She made the mistake of glancing over her shoulder, which proved just how truly close Lord Torrington was.
As close as she had once dreamed he would be. Her heart thudded faster, and to her chagrin, it didn’t have anything to do with the impending dread of being discovered by Lord or Lady Worthing. Rather, it had everything to do with the viscount. He was frowning down at the knot, looking terribly handsome, the sensual curve of his lips drawing her attention. His gaze flicked up to hers, his eyes a rich shade of green that seemed far more vibrant now than it had in the shadows from across the carriage.
For a moment, it was as if years of disappointment and rejection had not intervened since she’d first spied him from across a ballroom. Her breath caught, and a queer sensation tightened within her. Was it her imagination, or was there a flare of awareness between them?
“You’ll have to wait until I can untie this knot,” he said, dashing the stupid thought at once.
Of course, there was no awareness. She was the plain wallflower he had never noticed for five Seasons, unless it had been to disparage her in passing. The mistake he had unintentionally kidnapped instead of his beautiful mistress. Did her foolishness know no bounds?
She jerked her head forward so that he would not see the heat rising in her cheeks, the humiliated expression on her face. “Naturally, I didn’t intend to race into the town house with my hands tied behind my back.”
Elizabeth was doing her utmost to affect a cool, disinterested tone. But she was swimming in misery. In old memories. In longing. In fear of what she was about to lose.
Because if she lost her situation as governess to the earl’s young children, she doubted she could find another. And Lady Andromeda had been clear that her dwindling funds and ill health meant that she could no longer afford to be the sponsor of Elizabeth’s increasingly impossible dreams of becoming a wife and mother. Elizabeth was doomed to a life of taking care of the children of others, of never having her own. But it was preferable to becoming some wealthy man’s mistress, or worse.
At last, the knot loosened and her hands came free. Elizabeth moved them to her lap, relief washing over her, along with sensation—the prickle of thousands of tiny, invisible needles in her flesh.
“Oh,” she gasped softly, flexing her fingers, working the blood that had been denied them back into flowing.
“Are you hurt?” Torrington asked, taking up her hands in his.
